“...the story of Christ is simply a true myth: a myth working on us in the same way as the others, but with the tremendous difference that it really happened […] it is God's myth where the others are men's myths.” (C.S. Lewis)
“In Greek, paradox means literally “against opinion”; that is, a paradox rubs against our accepted notions of reality. We like to believe that we already know everything, that we have everything figured out; this is why true paradox is always painful. Paradox conflicts with our prejudices, challenges our assumptions, and flies in the face of our collective “truths.” This is why we prefer to call myths “fairy tales” and to relegate them to children. This is why we like to explain myths as fanciful inventions of primitive and childlike minds. If we take myths seriously as the statements of reality that they are, then we find all our comfortable platitudes, all our fixed notions of “truth,” called disturbingly into question.” (Robert A. Johnson)
“We have internalized the myth of progress and utility. We not only believe that the world and the things around us can be better, but that it is our God-given task to make them so. We push this same cultural mandate into the Scriptures as well. We imagine the parable of the good stewards (those who invested their talents of money and made a profit) to be stories of how God praised and rewarded them for their productivity and usefulness. We fail to wonder what actually constitutes faithful stewardship in the Kingdom of God.” (Father Stephen Freeman)
“The myth of progress operates on us in a pernicious way simply because we, society, have made progress an idol, breaking the second commandment. It’s not that progress is intrinsically bad, but rather our orientation and approach to it is. We have practically deified progress and elevated it to the highest human goal. Our primary goal in life is our loving union with God. Therefore all ‘progress’ should be a result of and through our loving submission to the Lord. This is an uncomfortable and unpopular truth that is dismissed as archaic and the misguided notion of unsophisticated people.” (Sacramental Living Ministries)
“By confessing and repenting of our sins, we find healing from self-inflicted wounds that bring only pain and weakness to our lives. Through these and other spiritual disciplines, we become more fully our true selves as the people God created us to be in the divine image and likeness. Doing so is neither easy nor popular, of course. It requires rejecting the popular myth that we are isolated and self-defining individuals who find meaning in gratifying our desires for power and pleasure however we want. Accepting that lie will lead only to idolatry, regardless of which worldly agenda we give our hearts to. We will find true joy and freedom in accepting the high calling to become more like God holiness, not in rejecting it. To turn away from who we are in God is to diminish ourselves and pursue a path that leads inevitably to misery and despair. As those who bear the divine image and likeness, we will find fulfillment only in Him.” (Fr. Philip LeMasters)